


Bound to You

by LadyRhi



Category: Reylo - Fandom, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Comfort Sex, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Intimacy, Emotional Sex, Enemies to Lovers, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, First Kiss, First Time, Forbidden Love, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Intimacy, Love, POV Rey (Star Wars), Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Rey Needs A Hug, Sex, Shameless Smut, Smut, The Force Ships It, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, Virgin Rey (Star Wars)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:34:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24886171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRhi/pseuds/LadyRhi
Summary: When Rey turned away from Kylo Ren, she believed she was leaving him and his Darkness behind for good. She committed herself to the Resistance's cause, but while her choice meant returning to her friends and fighting for the good of the galaxy, she was left to mourn the loss of the man she'd foolishly believed still lived behind a dark mask. She promised herself never to trust the entreaty in the dark eyes of her sworn enemy ever again.Loss has piled upon loss and the Resistance's great hope, their Jedi, has struggled to find her place in all this. People look to her for hope, but while they see her as the embodiment of an ideal, the lonely young woman behind it is more lost than ever before. Even the strongest among us fall to despair, at times, and when Rey reaches her breaking point one evening, comfort is offered by the one man she'd never have looked for it from. Can she resist the temptation of a warm embrace that promises her things she shouldn't want?If Rey dares to look beyond the mask, once more, will she face the monster she fears ... or the enduring flicker of hope she'd given up on.* Repost of OG One-Shot *
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 10
Kudos: 98





	Bound to You

**Author's Note:**

> Hey you!
> 
> If this title or the story sound familiar, then it may be because you've already read it. This story was originally written as a smutty one-shot, but then I went and wrote a plot, multiple chapters, and the rest is history. I went back and reworked this so it would fall in-line with certain details in the successive chapters. However, I'd wanted to keep this OG version around for those who prefer a one-shot. If that's what you're looking for, then this is the one for you!
> 
> If you enjoy this and would like to see more of this version of Rey & Ben, then be sure to check out the full fic, which has been retitled: ["As Stars Through Our Souls."](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24542773/chapters/59262064)
> 
> Much love! ♥

It hurt. Every time, without fail. With each battle, every raid on a First Order supply depot, and whenever a Resistance squad unluckily stumbled across or was tracked down by enemy forces, she knew there was sorrow to follow.

Rey didn't really know many of her fellow Resistance fighters, save Finn and Rose. Poe and Leia, too, she supposed. She'd started reaching out, trying to make friends after her return several months ago. There were so few of them left after the Battle of Crait and she felt the need to be with other people, forge relationships after the traumatizing events aboard the _Supremacy_ and the bitter disappointments she was left with. Rey had built a rapport with a number of the freedom fighters at first, but as one after another went off to do their duty for the cause, only to return in a bag or listed on a casualty report, she'd stopped.

Connection, it seemed, was far too costly when you were in a war that your side was gradually losing.

Another day. Another report of another run-in with yet another Stormtrooper Death Squad that turned out badly for the Resistance. Just routine. She'd have thought she'd be numb to it by now.

Rey didn't even know Hamla Vakk'ar, did she? Had she ever seen him -- her? -- at a tactical meeting, around the broken-down base, or in the mess hall? If she had, she wouldn't be able to match the face to the name. It was ridiculous to be sobbing over so little, just a collection of letters that formed the name of someone she'd never meet, now. Or remember, if she already had.

But whether it was that she felt it should mean something, even to a stranger like her, or was just the final blow Rey herself was capable of taking that day, she let the tears fall.

Rey sat there on the floor beside her bunk for hours as her eyes tracked the dimming square of light from her window across the floor until it was swallowed by the encroaching shadows. Finn had come by at one point, knocking on her door and inviting her to join him and Rose for dinner in the mess, but he'd quietly left when she didn't answer. She'd since stopped crying, eyes red-rimmed and cheeks tight from the salty tear-tracks that had dried there. A cavernous emptiness seemed to fill her, silent and stagnant. She almost believed, in that moment, that she'd never be capable of feeling anything again.

As if in answer to her morose musings, the stillness within Rey filled the air, sucking away the distant echoes of noise from the doings of those beyond her door and seeming to trap her in a bubble of reality separate from the rest of the galaxy. Her eyes remained nailed to the black patch of floor where the last ray of sunlight had shone before falling beneath the onslaught of night.

She knew he was there, felt him, but she didn't look up as he loomed above her huddled form. He looked at her, though. Rey could feel his piercing eyes rove over her face, along her folded limbs, and back. It had nothing to do with their Bond, it was just intuition. She was always so hyperaware of him and the unexpected immediacy of his presence, separated by uncountable light-years or not, made her double-check the lock she kept on her end of the mystical corridor that bound her heart to his. Lost in the storm of her grief, she'd let herself become too distracted to maintain her hold on it and he'd managed to slip past her defenses. Rey let out a sigh of relief, though, when she realized that while he could pull on the Force to bridge the star systems between their physical bodies, he wasn't able to brush aside the barrier around her mind. It gave him no hint, no clue as to what she thought, felt, or intended, but then it left her at the same disadvantage where he was concerned.

They were at an impasse.

The silence weighed on her, pushing her down further and further until she could barely breathe around the pressure. It made her frustrated, angry. Why didn't he just say something? He'd always been fond of the sound of his own voice before, pelting her with offers of mentorship, insults, accusations, and pleas. She'd thought it had been unbearable then, but now the unexpected lack of his ceaseless importunities was what she couldn't stand. Wetness leaked out of the corner of her eye, sliding down along the curve of her cheek, belying her belief that she'd been fully wrung out of tears.

Then he was crouching down before her, filling her senses with his immense closeness and the subtle spiciness of his cologne. Unexpected, that last detail. Rey had only ever been in close proximity to Kylo Ren when they'd been fighting -- against or alongside one another. He'd always smelled predominantly of sweat, but sometimes smoke, and often the blood of those he'd slain. Now, though, there were no lightsabers at-hand, no red-clad guards pressing in, and no blood-sown battlefield. Wherever he was and whatever he'd been doing before the Force had stretched out between them, it had nothing to do with punishment and death. At least, not delivered by his own hands.

Rey fleetingly wondered if anything else about him had changed in their months apart, but quickly yanked her thoughts back to the present concern of his face being mere inches from hers.

With no option but to look at him without standing from her slumped seat on the floor, and grudgingly fascinated by that new spicy scent, Rey finally peeked up at Kylo's face. He was much the same as she remembered. His skin was still pale from the artificial lighting of the starships he spent his days on, dotted with moles that traced across the surface of his face like dark stars, bisected by the deep scar she'd once branded him with. Hair like midnight fell in waves to rest along his collar, a bit longer than before, and those broad shoulders that carried the weight of whole worlds stretched beneath the severe black tunic of his uniform. No, not much had changed, physically at any rate, although she saw that his eyes looked tired, as though he lay awake long into the night before the relief of sleep came, if it ever did. Rey knew what that was like.

Kylo was regarding her with that intense stare of his, the one Rey always battled to meet, never willing to back down from the challenge it held. But though he had her face fixed in his sights, he wasn't trying to lock eyes with her. He was looking, instead, at the shiny line that fell along the skin of her cheek. She thought he almost looked bewildered by the sight, unsure what to do. Then his brow creased slightly as his hand came up and she felt the smooth leather of his glove stroke her skin before catching the falling drop of sorrow in his palm.

They both sat there, looking at the tear nestled in his hand, the fragile orb trembling as he breathed. After a few moments, Rey heard Kylo make a soft noise and she looked up, curious. A decision had clicked into place behind his eyes, she could tell, though what it was and where it would lead was a mystery. He turned his hand and the precious tear fell into the shadows that surrounded them. Then his gaze tangled with hers, at last, as he reached out and cupped her elbows, raising Rey to her feet. She allowed it simply because it took her by surprise. His touch was gentle, though his expression was oddly shuttered. The only hint of what was going on in his head was that disarming intensity that always seemed to burn right through her.

Still off her balance, Rey didn't register it immediately when Kylo stepped forward and drew her into him, wrapping strong arms around her. She just stared up, lips parted slightly in confusion, but then her brain managed to catch up and process the steps that had taken place between her sitting on the floor and being held in the embrace of the Supreme Leader.

What was he doing? What made him think he had the right to touch her this way? How dare he, after all he'd done?

But Rey didn't stop him. She should. She wanted to -- didn't she? -- but she lifted neither her hand to shove him away nor her voice to tell him no.

They stood together like that briefly, Rey staring up at his inscrutable face from the circle of his arms, before Kylo put his gloved hands around her waist and lifted, propping her on the edge of a counter or piece of furniture he must have in his unseen quarters. It was sufficiently deep for her to feel secure, but narrow enough that she felt a wall supporting her when she leaned back a little. If she'd looked down, she imagined she'd appear to be floating in mid-air. Normally, the absurd image would make her laugh, but not today. Not now, not here. Not with him. She just gazed helplessly up at his usually expressive face that he held immobile and waited.

His movements were measured, as though carefully planned and executed. She might have described it as 'military precision,' save for the fact that there was something softer to it that she almost, but didn't quite let herself identify as tenderness.

Large fingers hooked around the backs of her knees and started to draw them apart, finally sparking a reaction from her. Rey resisted, at first, startled and uncertain, but he just pulled resolutely without a word of either reassurance or annoyance. Then he stepped forward into the cradle of her pelvis and slid his palms up her thighs. She decided to take comfort from the sensual stroke, hoping he'd intended her to. Longing, against her better judgment, for him to want her to enjoy his touch.

And oh, she needed to be touched. She desperately wanted someone to hold her and make things a little more bearable. Rey would not have guessed that, after the Supremacy, such compassion might come from this man, however.

He reached for the buckle of her thin leather belt and paused, meeting her eyes. The heavy silence between them held a question. Rey reached up and wound her arms around his shoulders, pressing her face into the stiff fabric at the curve of his neck. She nodded her permission into his tunic, unwilling to look at Kylo Ren as she let this happen. If he reacted with satisfaction to her silent capitulation, it didn't come across in his steady breathing or deliberate movements as he worked to undo the fastenings of her clothes.

She almost wished the mental link that the Bond further bound them with was still open so that her mind could touch his, sense his thoughts and puzzle out the emotions he was concealing. Unlocking that door would be so easy, a simple concession in her own head. His end of the connection was open wide, unguarded, if watched carefully, waiting hungrily for her to venture towards it. She could wander right through in a moment, brush her consciousness against his and allow herself to feel the sweet belonging she'd known so briefly when their fingertips had touched in a lonely hut on Ahch-To. To give herself access to him, however, was to grant Kylo entry to her. So, she tamped the temptation down, trying to silence the insistent voice in the back of her mind that urged her to let go, to trust.

She'd trusted him before and only been left with the emptiness of disappointed hopes. So what was she doing, now? Rey had no idea.

The belt clattered to the floor and Kylo's hands moved to ruck her shirt up over her belly to get at the fastening of her trousers, lifting her slightly as he tugged them down and off her legs, her underwear soon following. He persuaded her to loosen her grip on him long enough to draw her shirt over her head and peel away her breastband. The chill of the room raised bumps along Rey's bared skin and she pressed closer to his warm frame. He set her back from him, though, gripping her hip with one firm palm to hold her in place. His other hand trailed lightly across the top of her thigh, back and forth in slow strokes that raised fine shivers along the base of her skull. It was soothing and she had to fight down the rising hope that it meant he really did want to help her through this, that his intentions were kind, and that he was still … that he was someone she'd told herself no longer existed.

His roving fingers slowly turned in a new direction. Higher, inward. Rey shivered, again, though not from the cold. Suddenly, she was impossibly warm, thoughts tumbling through her head frantically as she anticipated what was coming. Kylo hesitated briefly, as though giving her the opportunity to refuse him, a breath away from where all her awareness was now focused. Totally given over to this, she nudged her hips forward despite his firm grip, bringing her aching flesh to him. Rey cried out at the contact, muffling herself in his shoulder, feeling the quaking beneath her as his own breath hitched in reaction to her advance. Somehow, it was all more than either of them had been prepared for.

Taking Rey's invitation, Kylo immediately moved forward, gliding his fingers along her folds and pressing in to reveal the wet, wanting core of her desire beneath. Rey was overwhelmed by the supple texture of leather and moaned unhappily at the barrier separating her from the living skin beneath. His other hand squeezed her hip in rebuke as he continued to explore the most intimate parts of her body, known only to her until now.

Rey tried to hold still, but couldn't help panting into his neck as a seam covering one of his fingers dragged across the swollen bundle of nerves he'd found. She jerked and was frustrated by the restraining hold that wouldn't allow her to move. Her nails dug into the padded layers of his uniform and her heavy breaths turned into needy whimpers as Kylo continued to run the rough stitching in relentless circles, torturing the hot pearl of pure sensation. Pressure was building and he stoked the momentum to a fever-pitch when that finger dipped into her and then returned upwards, causing her heart to stagger in it’s throbbing race as the friction was transformed by the slickness of her excitement.

She was coming apart, unsure how their tempestuous relationship had come to this, and entirely beyond caring. Rey could only gasp breathily as Kylo worked her, rubbing, flicking, and stroking her towards a crescendo she was almost afraid to reach. He didn't allow her to ease away, though, wouldn't accede when she mindlessly begged for him to slow down. He pushed her onwards and she could only ride out the storm as he gathered it around her, every movement carrying her on an electric current that threatened to overload her senses.

Suddenly, Kylo released her hip and thrust a thick finger into her without warning and the discharge surged violently through her. Rey couldn't help a scream, biting down on black fabric to try and hold it back, unsuccessfully. He brought her on hard, continuing to rub insistently against the frenzied bundle of nerves that prolonged her peak until she thought she could no longer bear it. Stars burst behind her eyelids and she thought she could map the individual stiches in the leather of his gloved finger as her body clenched around him, embracing him as though she'd never let go.

Finally, Kylo slowed the demanding motions and drew his finger carefully from her trembling heat. She was cognizant enough to feel some embarrassment at the wet sound it made, but he soothed it away as he returned his hand to her hip, rubbing the palm in warm circles. Rey hid the tears that escaped at the sweet gesture, entranced by the slick trail left on her skin in the wake of his movements.

Rey slowly caught her breath, senses filled with the scent of spice as he held her in firm arms. She remembered how his alabaster skin stretched over muscle and bone as those arms had turned towards her in a shared moment through the Force. The raging sea of Ahch-To had been a perfect backdrop for the emotions that roiled through his biceps as they flexed in brooding discontent. She loved the feel of them supporting her now as her heart rate settled and she couldn't stop herself from moving her fingers into the silky hair resting along his collar.

She drifted in contentment as she allowed her mortal enemy to cradle her into his chest, but Kylo was far from done with her.

His free hand came up to grasp her other hip, pulling her back into him with an abrupt, insistent motion that sent a spike of anxiety through her chest even as her lower belly filled with liquid want. Part of her was shocked at the surge of need she felt after having just come harder than she ever had in her life, his fingers proving far more satisfying than her own. She kept her arms firmly locked around his shoulders, face still buried in his neck, admitting to herself she was afraid to peer up and see the look in his eyes, afraid of what emotion they would reveal. His touch had been kind in the aftermath of his attentions, but the way his fingers dug into her now was far from solicitous. He was demanding something of her, again, and she could feel the rising agitation run through his body as she refused to acknowledge it.

Had she given in and opened her end of the Bond, he'd have been aware of the swell of tension that choked her into silence, perhaps soothed her with another calming touch. Maybe he'd even have removed his gloves for her as he had once before. The door remained tightly barred, however, and he didn't pause to ease her fears.

_I've never done this before,_ she told him in her head, though he couldn't hear it. Her own decision didn't stop her need to commune with him, however, to reach out and know the man behind the unforgiving uniform in a way that so beautifully transcended the physical. What would it be to feel that, again, as he joined his body with hers? The idea made her lips tremble slightly, but she held firm and pressed her eyes shut against the fabric under her cheek.

Rey knew the mechanics of it. Growing up on Jakku, sex wasn't the delicately-guarded mystery it was on more civilized worlds. She'd seen the pleasure tents pitched on the outskirts of Niima Outpost where anyone fortunate enough to net spare portions could trade sustenance for an hour of carnal relief. That's all it was for most who saved up Unkar Plutt's scraps until they had enough for an offering. Marriage wasn't an institution on the harsh desert planet where life was far too transitory and miserable to be concerned with wanting to share it with someone else, though occasionally she'd see a successful scavenger shack up with a companion, the offer of being provided for the only vow required. It was always a transaction, however, and the idea of trading the food that barely sustained her existence for the dubious delights of being groped at the genuinely lethal risk of swelling with a life-sapping pregnancy had never appealed to Rey.

But with him? This wasn't about bartered favors, though they were each seeking something from the other. What was being given and offered in return was intangible, though, for all it was acknowledged through their physical bodies, wrapped around one another.

He wasn't Ben. He wasn't … right? But he was still … well, him. She didn't really know what that meant and right now she was struggling to decide whether it should even still matter, but it was enough for her to remain pliant in his arms as he shifted his hips, hands leaving her to undo the fastening of his trousers. It was the work of a moment and then hard heat was pressing against her with an intimacy that she'd never imagined allowing anyone to share with her before. She became keenly aware of how the whole of her body lay naked against his fully-clothed form. Save for the opening that freed his length, every button and buckle remained in place. And his hands still moved over her, the feel of the warm skin she recalled with longing withheld by the leather between them. It made Rey want to cry.

Soft lips surprised her as they pressed against the sensitive skin behind her ear and it was the most amazing feeling she'd ever known, even more so than the way he'd plucked her to an extraordinary high only moments ago. Tears pricked behind her eyes, still squeezed shut against him. It was too much, that kind of caress when he enforced a layer of separation even as he held her close. It meant too much. With an agitated shrug of her shoulder and an inarticulate sound of negation that came from the back of her tear-choked throat, she forced his mouth away from the sweet contact. There would be no kisses. Rey couldn't allow it and remain intact. They were something she could only ever have given to the half of his soul that he'd willfully killed. Kylo responded to her refusal with a noise of his own, and she didn't need to see is face or touch his mind to know that it was fury which caused his fingers to grip her skin hard enough to bruise.

_Another rejection,_ she thought with a pang of guilt. _He'd see it no other way._

He would have been justified if he'd pulled away, adjusted his trousers and lashed out with the Force to break their connection. Rey knew she'd cry if he did, too raw at this point to hold back the feelings and wishes she normally didn't allow to surface from the dark, hidden corner of her heart that haphazardly shut away almost everything pertaining to the man she still caught herself thinking of as Ben Solo. But he remained there with her, breathing deeply to calm himself, and she let a quiet cry of joyous relief escape. Her own fingers dug into the thick fabric of Kylo's tunic, clinging on with desperation. She'd pull him across whatever tunnel through space and time the Force had carved for them, if she could, hold him in truth rather than this pale approximation that was almost make-believe by comparison. She wrapped her bare legs around his hips, hugging him with her whole body to keep him there with her, in spite of the fact that he had apparently already decided to stay.

They remained like that, suspended in a moment that seemed to stretch for hours as his breathing evened out and she wound herself as tightly around him as she could. Whatever came next, however it happened and whether it was soft and sweet as she hoped or rough and impersonal as she feared, she knew she'd break without it.

Rey felt the tension in his fingers as he lifted her hips, tipping her pelvis so that her back bowed slightly, face still refusing to be dislodged from her hiding spot. She held her breath as one gloved hand moved away and she felt the blunt tip of him pressing at her entrance. A finger started to rub beguilingly into that epicenter of melting sensation right above where they were just barely joined, and he began to push forward slowly as she rewarded his attentions with a sigh that allowed her muscles to relax around him. Rey moaned as she realized how unbelievably thick and hard he was, parting her and gliding forward inch by tantalizing inch. It hurt and she felt her untouched flesh tear at the intrusion, but his earlier ministrations had teased out a generous slick of dew to ease his passage, finding further welcome as the stitched seam of the leather glove continued to pluck at her, easily distracting her mind from the mild burn.

He stopped when he was sheathed fully within her, tracing circles into her hip again as he gave her time to adjust to the unfamiliar invasion. Rey was grateful for it, though this further offering of consideration continued to confuse her swirling thoughts. Kylo was undermining every decision she'd made about him as she'd slammed the door of the Bond shut, watching how he'd stared up at her imploringly through their final connection on Crait.

When he pulled back, drawing out of her and then plunged back in with a sleek movement that sent frisson shivering up along her spine, Rey lost the will to worry over why he seemed determined to make this good for her and gave herself over to the pulsating surge coursing through her center. He withdrew and returned again, setting a pace that wrenched her breaths from deep in her belly. It was smooth and careful at first, allowing her to stretch and accommodate his girth, to take him deeper. But when Rey's voice vibrated with a strange, rapturous sound she could barely believe came from her own throat, the thread of his control seemed to snap and he advanced with strong, commanding thrusts.

As the momentum built and each collision of his tip against her end sent shockwaves raging along beneath her skin, Rey could only hold on tight as he rode her hard. She could feel his chest straining with effort and his own breath sawing in and out through lips that must be parted in exhilaration. It hit her that as overwrought as she was by the power he held over her in this illicit moment, she was having an equally shattering effect on him. The thought was intoxicating and her mind sought to reach out in spite of her reservations, her anxiety over what she'd find. Did she dare?

He slammed into her with jarring force as though he somehow sensed her wavering conviction, grinding into her with a circular motion of his hips that made her toes curl. Fingers rose to her waist, pulling her forward, trying to bring her closer to him with aching want. A drop of moisture landed on her back and slid down the curve of her spine. Sweat, surely, as they were both dripping with exertion. Her mind refused to deceive itself, though. Rey felt her chin pebble as her mouth curled at the agonizing feelings tearing through her heart. She couldn't resist it any longer. She needed him too much.

She gave up trying to hide away, to put up a pretense of passivity, to uselessly avoid the prospect of sharing culpability for what they did through ambiguous consent. Firmly tossing aside the story she'd pieced together in her head that protected her from complicity, while implicitly damning him, Rey raised her face from his shoulder. He was no longer doing this to her, they were doing it together. While he was taking, he was also giving and she met his dilated eyes as she finally dropped the last barriers she'd held up between them.

Rey moved with him, now, rolling her hips to take more of the heated length in, deeper with each undulation. She wanted to hold him inside, keep him there with her, in her, and all around her. The heady sensations crashed over the edge as the waves built higher and higher.

Rey reached for his hands, tearing the kriffing gloves away and casting them into the shadows behind them. Grasping his bare fingers and weaving them through hers, she rejoiced in the glorious familiarity that ran along her skin wherever it touched his.

She felt his rush of elation at her surrender to this, to him. To the man she'd finally opened her mind as well as her eyes to regard. His lips shivered with an unsteady breath and even in the dim light she could see the dark chocolate of his gaze glow with rising emotion. He pressed forward intently, eyes boring into hers, pushing her back so she couldn't move. They were connected to one another in every way, more so than anyone without the Force could be or even most who did. Their souls had been bridged months ago, and now they'd united their bodies, but it was Rey's capitulation to the desperate need to feel him in what was truly the most intimate form possible between them that had her gasping in rapture at the discovery she made.

_Ben._

He flooded her, all that he was, all that he hoped and believed and dreamed as he hid himself away behind a mask constructed around a fearsome name. That's all 'Kylo Ren' truly was, letters strung together in such a way that they deterred anyone from looking beyond them. Anyone but her.

She wanted to be closer, to really feel him. Annoyed by the thick uniform keeping her from his skin, Rey started tugging at his collar. Impatiently, she pulled and tore away at the maddeningly long row of fastenings that ran all the way down the front. He went through the insanity of doing all these up _every day?_ He was out of his kriffing mind!

Ben let out an amused sound and his hands came up to take over, seeing that she was determined to tear the shirt off his back one way or another. With practiced ease, he undid the interminable row only for Rey to groan at the sight of his undershirt. He snorted at her reaction, quickly ridding himself of both tunic and the loose shirt beneath before grabbing her and starting to move once more.

Rey's mind sang with joy as she clasped Ben close, reveling in the feel of running the skin of her body along his. The sensations his touch sent through her were so much more potent now that she truly knew whose touch she felt. He seemed equally elated, resting his forehead against hers in relief that the secret was finally shared with the only one he cared to know it. At hearing that thought pass through his head, Rey was tempted to argue for Leia's right to know her son was not really gone. Surely his own mother deserved that. Any righteous indignation flowed right out of her, though, as his hips pulled away and snapped back into her, grinding the ridge of his pelvic bone slowly upward in a way that sent shivers along every nerve in her body.

She decided to let the matter rest as her attention was once more overwhelmed by the sheer power of Ben's presence, the way he stoked the wildfire at her core ever higher even as he brushed captivatingly along the edges of her mind with his. Rey allowed herself to sink back down into the enchanting passion he was seducing her with.

It was Dark, so very Dark. For a moment, she thought she was drowning in it, but then Ben caught her, held on and promised never to let go. The shadowed core within her responded eagerly, reaching out to the brooding thunderhead that roiled with the restless storm of all that he was. She reveled in the sensations as he drew her into his mind even as she took him into her body. They moved together, their metaphysical joining mirroring the gliding, grinding, heart-stopping motions that pressed her into the unseen wall at her back with each thrust.

She was a little surprised to realize there was still a stream of Light shining through them as they moved. Despite the profound sensuality they'd brought to life between them, the territory of the Dark Side, it was tempered by the enduring radiance that was tightly woven into the fabric of Rey's being. It found a small, but very real answering glimmer within him. As it tugged at them both, Ben brought his face in close, leaving only a breath of space between their sweating foreheads. But he didn't kiss her. The decision had to be Rey's, he wouldn't have it any other way. He needed her to want him in return, to have her accept all that he was, Darkness and Light. With the Bond blown open, Rey knew he could feel the depth of her desire not just for the physical ardor they shared, but everything that tied them to one another and led to this moment as an inevitable conclusion.

Rey wanted him, body, mind, and soul. So, when he plunged his hips forward again, bringing his pelvis flush against her and seating himself as deeply as he could reach, she gave all of herself in return. Embracing Ben mentally and spiritually, she chose to seal their physical union with that which she'd previously denied him.

His lips were impossibly soft and supple. Rey's first movements along their sinful curves were curious and awkward, not entirely sure of how this worked, now that it came to it. If sex was a mere transaction on Jakku, and marriage a waste of time, then romance and tender caresses were practically mythological. She'd never kissed anyone before and she cringed inside as she found her mouth frozen against his, mortifyingly lost.

Rey opened her eyes to look up at him vulnerably before shutting them tight and quickly pulling away, face burning. He'd stopped moving when she'd initiated that horrid excuse for what couldn't even be called a kiss. She'd just mashed herself gracelessly against him and he had to think her pathetically inept. Rey wanted to cry all over again. Karking hell, but where had her hard-bitten survivor's backbone gone? Today had made a pitiful puddle out of her.

Ben continued to hold her, though, and through the haze of humiliation, she realized that he was waiting for her to meet his gaze again. If it weren't for the fact that he was still buried to the hilt inside her, making her inner walls pulse with each slight shift as they breathed raggedly, she'd have torn herself out of his arms. As it was, she was well and truly stuck. She gave in and lifted her heavy eyes upwards.

And then he smiled.

Rey forgot how to breathe as she stared in wonder at the expression she'd never thought to see on his face. Stern, sulky, unforgiving, and often furious, the lines of his face had seemed carved too deeply to be capable of anything else. Yet here he was, mouth lifting in a lopsided smile, smoothing away the habitual crinkles between his brows and replacing them with ones at the corners of his eyes. And kriff, did Kylo Ren actually have _dimples?!_ No, she told herself as she felt her own expression light up to match the one on his face. But Ben Solo did.

It made Rey brave, again. Still smiling she moved to brush her mouth against his, and this time he responded. Ben guided her, prompting her with his mind and sending his pleasure purring along their Bond to settle warmly in her chest. As he tenderly taught her how to kiss, he started to move his hips gently again, easing them into a rhythm that built to match the motions he drew from her lips. It was luxuriously poignant and Rey lost herself in the beauty of how they made one another feel, sensation echoing from one end of the Bond to the other.

Eventually, Ben led their mouths into a sultrier cadence, deepening their kisses. He sent a request across to her mind as the tip of his tongue pressed softly against her lower lip, asking her to open for him. When Rey did, something seemed to overflow in his mind and she felt him drag her over the edge with him. He delved past her lips with tongue and teeth even as his thick length thrust into her with reckless abandon, raising the fire in her core to an inferno. She gladly burned with him.

It built and built, sending them to an impossible height that Rey wasn't sure she could safely find her way down from. She'd spiraled out of control, given herself over completely to the way he felt inside her, filling her with such searing pleasure-pain that stars burst behind her eyes. If she fell now, she was sure she'd shatter into a million pieces. But Ben was with her, mind and body holding her up as their souls writhed in a feverish dance, heedless of the emergency their world-bound hosts were fast approaching.

Ben broke the kiss and pulled her close so that their bellies and chests molded against one another, resting his forehead on hers, once more. She'd squeezed her eyes shut as a wave rose up deep behind her navel, where the tip of him assaulted something inside her that throbbed with each breathtaking lunge he took. Ben squeezed her hip, demanding, and her eyelids lifted with difficulty in response. He caught her enraptured gaze with his, forbidding her to look away.

They stared into each other, sweat dripping to pool along the seam where her breasts pressed into his straining chest, the spicy scent of him driving her mad. He ground into her hard and fast, breathing heavily with exertion, and they rose together on the cresting wave. Ben let out a sharp huff when she felt him twitch against her inner walls and as she breathed him in, Rey's muscles hitched. She stilled in astonishment, her pupils bleeding outwards to consume the hazel of her irises. She fell around him. His arms were there to hold her, but she barely felt them as Light and Dark tore through her, blowing her mind open wide. Rich, voluptuous sensation poured over her as she felt him begin to thrust urgently again, distantly aware he was chasing his own release.

Release? Was that what this was? It seemed far too tame a term. To her, it was an explosion. A whole star system was set alight by the blinding detonation of the sun it wound itself around when its end was reached.

Rey felt herself ignite.

She breathed his name, the name of the man she now knew he still was, chanting it in scattered whispers that he took in as his mouth claimed hers. Ben drove into her several more times before he gasped and threw his head back, neck bared, burying himself deep. The sight of him was magnificent and her still-stormy mind delighted in knowing that it was she who had pushed him to this precipice, wanting to throw herself over it and into his waiting arms again and again.

They came down slowly, nestling against one another with blissful devotion. Ben gathered her into the circle of his arms, again, and pressed his lips into her hair before she settled her head beneath his chin. He remained deep inside her, his hardness ebbing away as they both relearned to breathe with unsteady progress. Rey had thought nothing could match the fiery build-up of their bodies moving together, but she realized that this was even better. The soft intimacy of Ben's warm embrace, basking in the afterglow with him as salty sweat and spicy scent charmed her healing heart.

What would she not give to live in this moment forever? To let the galaxy's conflicts pass them by, to allow the duties and expectations demanded of them fall aside and remain in their little bubble of reality, holding to one another. To escape their roles as the Resistance's Jedi and the First Order's Supreme Leader -- to simply be Rey and Ben.

Rey sighed, knowing none of that was possible. Wishes would not be enough to overcome what kept them apart. She raised her head to peer up at his somnolent gaze and thought resolutely, _Well, not yet._ She lifted her hand to run the pads of her fingers along the jagged path of the scar she'd marked him with months ago. Ben's eyes watched hers with the glow of such deep feeling as she traced the course down his face and along the column of his throat. When she reached the scar's end over the thick muscle of his chest she pressed her lips to it, smiling as his abs flexed in response. His fingers tangled in her hair, tugging her back up so that he could capture her mouth in another mesmerizing kiss that was no less hungry for the satiation that flowed along her tired muscles. Yes, she'd happily remain like this for all eternity.

But acknowledgement of the reality beyond their Force-granted interlude seemed to signal its conclusion. Her throat burned as she felt the Bond beginning to unravel, dragging them apart even as they gripped one another more fiercely. Ben drew out of her regretfully before lifting her and sliding her along his body to set her gently on the floor, knowing the surface he'd propped her up on would soon be withdrawn. As he faded from sight, Rey kept her eyes on his and then closed them so that she could see those dark depths in her imagination when he was gone.

She felt so empty, so cold, and so alone. After discovering all they could have if only they let themselves reach for it, Rey felt her heart break knowing that they would not be able to realize the new dream they now shared for a wrenchingly long time … if ever.

Angry that the beauty of the time she'd had with Ben had turned so quickly to bitterness, she looked across the floor of her lonely bedroom, aimlessly searching for her scattered clothes. She raised a surprised brow when she noticed a crumpled leather glove in the corner. It restored a smile to her face, if only a small one. Taking long breaths, Rey tried to find calm and reached for the Light, letting it cradle her raw emotions in its soothing warmth as she regained her equilibrium. It was an impossible situation, true, but she hadn't fought through two decades of hardship and strife, abandoned and abused, only to cave in defeat when she finally found the person who made her hollowed-out heart feel whole.

For all that they remained on opposite sides of a war tearing the galaxy apart, she now knew that the villainous Supreme Leader was more than he seemed. More than he pretended. Kylo Ren had kept a secret, hoarding it away until Rey was ready to look for herself and draw it out from the concealing shadows.

Ben Solo lived.

Matters were no less complicated than before this interlude of theirs. Quite the contrary. As Rey looked down at herself, seeing and feeling the results of their lovemaking, she admitted that everything had just become much more difficult for them both. Yet, recognizing that, the scrappy survivor in her knew that it didn't come down to how hard you had to fight, but how much what you fought for meant. Lifting a finger to run it gently along the swollen skin of her lower lip, Rey knew that Ben was worth it.

It wasn't even a question, whether they would meet again.

Perhaps he heard her thoughts or was sitting on his own in the isolating quarters of a Star Destroyer, thinking to himself and reaching the same conclusion. Whatever the future held, for better or worse, the words that rolled like sensual thunder along the reforged mental links of the Bond sent a fiery spark of anticipation through her.

_**Oh, Rey. We're not done, yet.** _

The husky promise wrapped around her mind like an embrace, exultant and determined never to let go. Rey closed her eyes and smelled the heady blend of spiciness and sweat he'd left behind to linger on her skin.

_**No, Ben. We are not.** _


End file.
